The Reality
by insert cliche
Summary: Wake up, Tsunade. It's time to stop dreaming and get going.


**Disclaimer**: I do not own Naruto, in any way, shape, or form. The characters and setting used all belong to Masashi Kishimoto.

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**The Reality**

This is not Konoha.

You know this because Konoha is not a mess. It may be _messy_, yes, but it is not made up of stones and wood and rubble and blood splattered everywhere. It is not a place where everyone is crying or dying (or even worse, _dead_, but that doesn't register in your mind yet).

Konoha, the Village Hidden in the Leaves, is gone.

And knowing this, that this city used to be a city full of people and dreams and _life_, makes it hurt all the worse. People used to base their very existence off of this place, but everything . There's nothing left to see, to save. Huge, half-standing buildings line the rubble-covered streets, and if each window used to have at least one person behind it, then there are already hundreds of people that have lost something, anything, or everything. Most likely everything.

(...you wonder how much it will take to fix the damages)

And everyone is here. The elite ANBU, who are almost never seen out of their dark and dreary headquarters (wherever that is), are flitting here and there, disposing of dead bodies and dealing with the last of the invaders. The ever-reliable jounins, beginning to clean up the remnants of the village and trying to organize what's left. Kakashi, renowned for his perpetual tardiness, is here, doing more work than you've ever seen the copy-nin do before. The chuunin are helping, the older ones doing the same things as their jounin peers, the younger ones tailing their mentors (even now, because some bonds will never break). Some of the more emotional chuunin are comforting civilians and herding them to safety. And the genin, all looking small and scared and lost, sticking to their jounin teachers like there is no tomorrow (because the Academy doesn't teach the brats how to deal with the end of a battle like _this_, because they've only ever had relatively bloodless sparring matches against each other), because it's their first time seeing death in all its glory.

Even people from other places are here. There are Suna-nin in the distance (you think, because your eyesight can't be trusted completely anymore, not with all the dust in the air and tears in your eyes)You see fishers and builders from the Land of Waves arriving, see Naruto greet one of the teenagers enthusiastically. There's a lot of work to be done here.

Gai's team arrives, and you suddenly wonder where they've been. It doesn't occur to you that you were the one who sent them out on a mission just a week ago. (Was it a whole week? Why does it feel so long?) The kunoichi of the team (What's her name? Tenten?) gasps slightly when she sees all of the destruction for the first time.

There are posts without lamps, ladders without rungs, and domino games made out of old vendor's carts. Signs are scattered everywhere-you notice the Ichiraku banner floating in the breeze from its position under a random chunk of roof. (In the back of your mind, you know that Naruto won't be happy, even if there are worse things going on right now.) Buildings everywhere have been toppled over.

You look to the Hokage Mountain, and find that all of the five faces on the mountain are staring back at you, wondering what your next move is going to be. Are you going to help, or will you withdraw and let the village (_your_ village) collapse into ashes or dust? You stare back into your own stony eyes, the chiseled rendition of your face looking more full of life than you feel right now.

Right now is just another time when you wish you didn't have to be the leader, didn't have to be the one to make the decisions. You want to go back in time, when you knew the village was safe under the Fourth, when you could do anything without consequence (gambling doesn't count).

Heck, even having Jiraya here would be nice. But _no_, that stupid idiot had to leave to deal with his unofficial former students (and get killed in the process). He wasn't even sucessful. Why did he have to leave you like that, like every other important person in your life has left you? Nawaki, Dan, Orochimaru (you could never stop caring about him), now Jiraya.

Who's next? Sakura? Shizune? _Naruto_?

Naruto can't die. If he dies, it either means that the Akatsuki has finally extracted the Kyuubi, or that the Kyuubi has died with him. If the Akatsuki get him, then the world ends, and if that brat dies of his own doing (even if it is near impossible), the village has nothing of importance anymore. Either way, Konoha will go up in flames.

Shizune's voice brings you back to reality.

"Tsunade-sama? Are you alright?"

You jump slightly (only a little bit, because you're still the Hokage, no matter how much you don't want to be right now) and stare at her, trying to comprehend what she has just asked you. Finally, everything clicks into place, and you answer.

"Of course."

"What do we do now?" Her words are soft, so much quieter than the cacophony around you.

"We'll rebuild today. We can deal with the damn Akatsuki tomorrow."

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